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iTunes visualises lyrics

newsticker meets Prince' Sign 'o' the Times esthetics in iTunes Visualiser
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Analyses voice in the structure of a song, compares with lyrics parsed from 'the internets' and automagically displays the words to the song in the style of the Sign o' the Times musicvideo (see YouTube link).

<added later> If distinguishing voice from music might be difficult for certain kinds of music, a prepared, manually fine tuned, timecode from another user (in some online database) is the first choice for the application.

Just like you keep .srt files next to .divx movies, you then store those .srt files with timecodes next to your mp3 collection.</addition>

rrr, Nov 28 2006

(?) Sign o' the Times http://www.youtube....watch?v=E_v-meJ7D7E
the video on YouTube [rrr, Nov 28 2006]

lyrics database example http://www.oldielyr...gn_o_the_times.html
just one of the many databases with lyrics from popular songs that listen to the query lyrics in combination with the title of the song [rrr, Nov 28 2006, last modified Nov 29 2006]

The Kleptones mix music and lyrics from different sources http://www.kleptone.../downloads_24h.html
The Kleptones pick a song and filter the music out and mix it with another song with the vocals filtered out. Listen for example to how they combine The Clash with Rock the Casbah and David Bowie in the first song on their album '24 hours', which you can download for free under a Creative Commons license. [rrr, Nov 28 2006, last modified Nov 29 2006]

(?) tascam vocal trainer http://www.tascam.c...ucts/cdvt1mkii.html
vocal "eliminator" [bleh, Nov 28 2006]

get subtitles for movies http://www.divxsubtitles.net/
There are many websites which offer text files containing the subtitles to popular movies. The timing is contained in the text file in some standardised format. Just place the file with the subtitles in the same directory as the divx and play (with the VLC mediaplayer for example) [rrr, Nov 28 2006]

(?) Identity 2.0 presentation http://www.identity...om/media/OSCON2005/
Presentation in Lawrence Lessig style with practically every other word illustrated with a picture [rrr, Nov 28 2006]

mini lyrics http://www.viewlyrics.com/
this app does a reasonable job of, ahem, looking up the lyrics to the current song in a database. [neilp, Nov 28 2006]

(?) Lyrics widget for OS X Dashboard http://www.apple.co.../singthatitune.html
It's been a few years since I last tried a widget in Dashboard to get the lyrics for the iTunes song I am listnening to, but I now found one that both looks good (it includes the cover art) and does a good job. [rrr, Nov 29 2006]

CoverVersion http://www.imagomat.de/coverversion/
displays lyrics in combination with cover artwork when the iTunes Visualiser is switched on [rrr, Dec 09 2006]


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Annotation:







       thats asking a lot from a music player, dont ya think?   

       is it supposed to store the lyrics to all your songs on your harddrive or stream then from some mysterious source on "the internets"?   

       also, how is iTunes to analyze the voice in a song? its dealing with a simple stereo wav or mp3 file, not individual tracks. that essentally makes separating the voice from the rest of the mix damned near impossible unless the voice is panned dead center and everything else is 100% left or right.   

       bone withheld hoping for further explination.
bleh, Nov 28 2006
  

       Actually, I do not expect iTunes to do it all. Just some extra application that is tied to iTunes. If iChat can read what song I am playing, so can any other app I guess. Also see the links to the left of this as an attempt to answer your question and to avoid the smelly fish.
rrr, Nov 28 2006
  

       nice links, but again, is this extra application supposed to do all this real time or do it when you import and save like 3 files per song, then incorporate them all when the vizualizer is turned on?   

       also, people can spearate lyrics from music by carefully aplying filters and eq to it dynamically , but a computer would have a helluva time trying to follow that with an algorythym (sp?). people can do it mainly by ear.   

       I'd love to see the technology, right now it doesnt exist. I work in a music store and we sell product that is suposed to "eliminate vocals" (linky) but all it does is kill then center channel, where many vocals are mixed. often there are additional vocals (harmonies, reverbs, etc) mixed to one side or the other. they make similar pieces to elimnate guitar or bass, but those are just EQ tricks and are equally dissapointng.
bleh, Nov 28 2006
  

       Good suggestion, let the app do the analysis of the tracks and retrieving of lyrics at some other time. The end user should also be offered some editing screen in which you can fine tune the results. Other fonts, play with sizes, colors and so on.   

       For tracing the vocals it might be helpful that the lyrics are known because the title and artist are in plain text. The bpm and the length of the song are also known. All that together should be enough to get the lyrics more or less timed correctly to the vocals. And the end user can do some fine tuning and post the result as an .srt file back on the web, to share with other users. Let a new subculture of user generated content evolve out of this, in the same style of that rage of 'demoing' (does it still exist?).
rrr, Nov 28 2006
  

       No, this is all too simple. The idea needs to be more complex.   

       The application should review the lyrics and construct a video from stills and video from the net.
normzone, Nov 28 2006
  

       ok, if the end user imputs it using timecode as he listens to the song, that is a lot more feasable, as it doesnt require an (currently) impossibly complex computer program. I dont think even knowing the length of a song would help a program as it doesnt account for solos, long interludes, and the like.   

       so what would probablly work best would be a program that plays the song and allows you to type (or drag the downloaded lyrics) along timecode while listening to the song. that way the human ear can interprit the dynamics of the music and make everything line up better. maybe hit the spacebar to inser the next word at that point in the timecode, hold the bar down for sustain. something liek that. other expressiveness (color, font, boldness) could be controlled with other keys.   

       bun if you take out the computer analyzing the vocal track.
bleh, Nov 28 2006
  

       > a video from stills and video from the net <   

       Perhaps not that ambitious right away, but just like in the Prince video certain expressions are replaced with icons, the user should be allowed to insert emoticons and or references to a directory of JPEGs that replace certain words. Just like that great Keynote presentation on BoingBoing a while ago. A kind of Lawrence Lessig on steroids presentation, practically every word was illustrated with a picture. It was on Identity 2.0, see link.
rrr, Nov 28 2006
  

       Nice review of the Prince clip! Makes you watch again. Closely.
rrr, Nov 28 2006
  

       What you want is a karaoke file, or karaoke MIDI file, with just the lyrics extracted, and parsed by your iTunes plug-in in sync with the track.
BunsenHoneydew, Dec 03 2006
  

       BunsenHoneydew said it right. It should not be hard at all to incorporate this data into any track. It's just red tape that's it.
twitch, Dec 04 2006
  

       It is a little baked in the meanwhile. Some German wrote 'Coverversion'. See link.
rrr, Dec 09 2006
  


 

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